Planning for Failure
by Rambaud
Summary: Harry takes a stand against being strongarmed into the Triwizard Tournament.
1. Chapter 1

**Pre-Chapter Note** :Okay, so my other story is struggling a bit. I have a few things to change in previous chapters, my plan for future ones seems to have a life of its own and the last months of my school year are being especially difficult to top it all off. So right now, I don't have a choice but too let the flux dissipate a bit.

But something else kind of wrote itself. A bit of an easier write. I've envisioned it up to around 10k words organised in 5 chapters, and I may or may not keep going afterwards.

Evidently none of these characters belong to me, though. They're someone else's. I forget who. John Rawls, maybe? Rudyard Kipling?

* * *

On the big screen, Harry gulped. The arena was big enough that he could hide from the dragon and gather his courage from the safety of the shadow of a large rock.

Their first idea had been to learn the summoning spell to bring his broom in play, but after a long conversation, Harry and Hermione had changed it. They had thought long and hard about the possible motivations of whoever had forced him in the tournament, and after reviewing what they knew of the rules they decided that there actually was a way to play it even safer, while thwarting most possible plans his enemies could have.

Losing.

He brought his wand to his throat, and Hermione saw him mutter _'Sonorus'._ He got up, carefully staying outside the field of vision of the dragon and spoke in a powerful voice which seemed to come from everywhere at once

"I give up."

The crowd silenced itself in surprise. A few laughs arose after a while. It was certainly a bit humiliating, but he continued nonetheless.

"I fail, give me zero and let's move on to the next task..."

The laughter and disbelieving noises were steadily growing in volume.

"Well, what did you expect? I was very clear that I don't want any part of this. I'm here against my will, and I have no wish to battle a dragon so I give up. I only came down here because I'd lose my magic if I didn't."

There were a few cries of 'coward' in the crowd.

"What do you _mean_ coward? Of course I don't want to battle a dragon, do _you_ want to battle a dragon? Whoever called me a coward can just come down here and steal that egg themselves if they find it so important to prove their worth to a bunch of strangers... Also, I've done my share of reptilian assault two years ago, thank you very much."

Hermione chuckled at that, and the rest of the crowd started laughing more and more at the show he wasn't putting. The audience seemed to split between the few who agreed and the rest, who made it very clear that they didn't.

"And as a wise person told me, being brave isn't always running into mortal peril. Sometime it's also doing what's right even if people don't understand. I'm not even supposed to be here..." "

Hermione was a bit flustered that he had repeated almost word for word the argument she had used to convince him that it wasn't running away.

"Anyway, this _Tri_ wizard tournament should be between the other three. The least I can do is get out of their way, and resist whoever wants me in here as best I can."

Bagman finally regained his composure, and started talking directly to Harry. His voice overpowering the boos with the same magical amplification spell: he was the one she had learnt it from and taught it to her friend.

"Uh... I'm afraid you can't 'give up', boy. You have to try, and either you end up stealing the egg or fail and be extracted from the arena."

"Okay then. I didn't know that. I guess that just goes to show that the best contract are the _written-on-a-piece-of-paper-kind_. You know, the kind one can actually read? And sign themselves? So If for some reason I'm unable to fight, the medical team will come get me?"

"Well of course."

"Okay then. I hope they get here fast."

He cleared his throat, and spoke in a phony voice that was somewhat reminiscent of Lockhart's boasts.

"I will now attempt to _stupefy_ this dragon through this rock. Gosh, I sure hope I'm not holding my wand backwards. _Stupefy!_ "

There was a red flash behind the rock, and a thud. The medical team immediately trotted into the arena to retrieve the self-stupefied boy, while the dragon tamers came in to carefully subdue the Hungarian Horntail who hadn't even bothered to uncurl from her nest during the exchange. Some of the crowd booed, some laughed; Hermione was among the very few who cheered... The jury was torn: 0 from Karkaroff, 0 from Mme Maxime, 0 from Bagman and 10 from Dumbledore.

"Reelly, Professeur Dumbly-door, if ze boy wants to lose, let 'im lose." She heard Madame Maxime say.

"I wanted to show my support, but I didn't know what to choose between zero and ten." He joked

One task down, two to go. Hermione reviewed her friends in the audience, trying to ascertain the reaction of her house. The Weasley twins were crying with laughter in each other's arms, and so did a few other of the more prank-savvy Gryffindors, who just had to admire Harry's gumption. Ron looked like he hadn't yet decided what to think of what had just happened. The rest was outraged. They had wanted him to get the cup for Gryffindor, as stupid as that was, and were appalled at what they surely perceived to be cowardice. Well. They _were_ lions. Even Harry had been reluctant at first. Most of the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs looked very happy, though.

Well at least a few more people would realise he really was doing this against his will. She hoped at least Ron would get it now, but based on the way his expression was evolving, it didn't look that way.

* * *

Harry was reading in the common room, painfully aware that his friend was staring a hole in his left temple, seeming to hesitate angrily whether or not to bring something up.

"I seriously don't get you, Harry."

Harry seriously didn't get Ron. But he didn't tell him that, instead he laid down his book and waited patiently for his friend to develop his sudden statement. Harry had gathered from Ron's initial reaction to the fourth name popping out of the goblet that he wasn't actually very good at expressing his feelings in an orderly fashion. More specifically, he wasn't very good at sorting what feelings deserved expressing in the first place. It became clear that Ron needed to be beckoned to continue.

"What don't you get, Ron?"

"Why would you do that? How can you make a fool of yourself, of the school, Gryffindor, the whole tournament..." He was obviously cross.

"And why does what I did make you so angry?"

" _Why_? Look. I don't care _how_ you got in the tournament. You say it's a plot against you, and I must admit that I find it hard to believe that giving you one of the best opportunities for the future, one of the most sought after spot in the school _and_ in society in general and giving you a chance to win even more fame and fortune than you already _have_ could be construed as a plot _against_ you. But _let's just disregard all that_. You _insist_ that you don't actually _want_ the attention. So what do you do? Why of course! You just disrespect everyone, make a very public scene and make a fool of yourself and everyone present _on purpose_. _How does that reduce the attention_? It doesn't! It's just you putting yourself above what we all – what everyone else would _kill_ to have."

There was a long pause; Harry needed to sort Ron's points. Eventually he found a seam to try and unravel the ball of red hot anger that his comrade in arms had become:

"So... This has nothing to do with the tournament, then, right? You're just angry at me for finding myself at the centre of something big again, right?"

" _What_?" Harry sighed loudly, trying to manage his exasperation.

"Listen, Ron. We've said some pretty hurtful things to each other, and the truth is I want nothing more that to make good with you. But I just don't see how I can make you... What I can do for you to stop being angry at me. First, you're certain that I entered on purpose, to the point of calling me a _liar_ to my face; I try my best to _prove_ that I do not, in fact, want to be a part of this. But that's not okay either because... because what? Because I disrespected an institution? I'm fighting for my _life_ , here, Ron. I _do not care_ about this tournament. I don't want any part of it and never have. You seem to want my spot in it; if I _could_ , I would _gladly_ give it to you – except for the fact that I highly suspect someone is going to try to cut it short during one of the tasks and–"

"So you insist on calling me jealous? Well _fine_! You know what? I _am_! I want fame and fortune – _everybody does_ , by the way – but it looks like I'm just destined to look at it from the sidelines. And _Okay_! That's _fine_. I guess I'm from a family of sidelines dwellers and it looks like I've found myself trapped in a pretty big shadow on my first trip to Hogwarts. I can be okay with that! But do you have to be so... so scornful about it all? Is it not enough that you have everything and me nothing, do you absolutely have to _shit all over it too_?"

" _But it was_ _**already**_ _covered in shit when I found it, Ron_! This is not a fun adventure! _This_ is the people who _killed my parents_ trying to _kill me_!"

"Right, Harry. This is not you having fun. This is some unseen threat who wants to kill you. And in order to do that, they just _have_ to make you even more of a superstar. They just couldn't find anything more convoluted than make you an _impossible fourth_ _champion_ , and hope against hope that a lethal accident would somehow occur on a tournament overseen by the most powerful wizards in the world, under the supervision of dozens of trained professionals whose only concern is _your_ safety. Because it's perfectly clear that this unseen threat couldn't just – oh, I don't know – _wait for the summer vacations to follow you home from King's Cross and pluck you from a defenceless muggle house. Well_ _ **no**_ _! That wouldn't be_ _ **dramatic**_ _enough!_ "

At this point, Harry was pretty thankful that Ron stomped off with billows of angry smoke trailing from his fiery head, because though Ron's bad faith regarding the possibility of an assassination attempt on the _boy-who-lived_ was painfully obvious (especially after the last few school years), his final point left him befuddled. Why _didn't_ they just do that? He turned and looked between the figures of other Gryffindors trying to pretend they hadn't heard all that, to find Hermione wearing a similar look of sudden interrogation as she slowly turned to him from across the room.


	2. Chapter 2

"No."

She raised her right eyebrow pointedly at the youth's outburst of subversion.

"Excuse me?" Minerva used what she thought was an appropriately stern tone. In the past, that particular question had already proven its effectiveness, quenching more violent insurrections from more troublesome children. Yet she noted that, though his audible gulp and fearful shudder seemed to indicate otherwise, his green eyes had barely wavered.

"I'm sorry, Professor. Please let me rephrase..." He thought long and hard under her doubtful gaze. Eventually his eyes met hers with a tame, respectful defiance. "I understand that you're doing this with both my and the school's best interests in mind." He reddened a bit "I also understand that you think my reticence is simply a fourteen-year-old's shyness at the prospect of having to ask a _girl_ to a _ball,_ and having to open it with a _dance_. I won't insult you by pretending that it hasn't weighed in my decision..."

Well that was a pretty strong overture, she waited patiently for him to form the inevitable 'but'.

"In fact, if I may be so bold..."

He lifted his gaze and smiled at her with gentle humour. The 'but' would have to wait: Mr. Potter felt _bold_ , for a change. Well it was a rare occurrence to see him feel _bold_ right to her face.

"If I may be so bold, I... I want you to know I'm grateful for what you're trying to do. I understand that you're looking out for me, here. I'm pretty sure that you think this ball would end up being a welcome distraction from this year's new and improved plot-to-kill-the-boy-who-lived."

Minerva was both impressed and depressed at that remark. Before she caught them, her eyes flickered to her joined hands resting on her desk in a short-lived expression of shame. She hoped he hadn't caught it. She didn't want to confirm or deny, but he already had an awkward look of tentative reassurance about him.

"And if I'm being perfectly honest, perhaps it would be. Normal teenager stuff: courting, asking girls out... Spending a nice evening dancing in formal wear... _But_."

Finally. His embarrassed gratefulness dissolved, leaving a husk of his smile behind; a hollow ghost of his appreciation on his forlorn expression.

"But I'm afraid shyness is only an afterthought here. If it were just that, I would resign myself..." His eyes had a sudden burst of renewed humour "I would try to grapple with my courage only to fail miserably, and end up being a pretty terrible date for a perfectly nice girl whose only fault would have been to have two feet and a self-esteem for me to accidentally trample on like a blundering fool. Normal teenager stuff."

She allowed a good natured smile to pierce through her stern mask. But after this sentence, his grin disappeared completely into a sad resignation.

"No, the real reason is that... Please don't take it personally but..."

He bit his lip.

"I'm sorry, Professor, but you're wrong."

Well saying that would have taken a lot out of him. She almost opened her mouth, but managed to convince her pride to shut up and listen to the core of his argument.

"I'm not representing Hogwarts, Cedric is. I'm not representing Gryffindor, _Cedric is_ : Gryffindor is a part of Hogwarts. The _truth_ is that I'm here because of a... mistake. An injustice, even. And I _have_ to protest it: I find myself bound by a contract that I haven't read or signed, not to mention the fact that even if I _had_ , it should be void because of my age. I have to remind everyone that I am not a champion. In this case – just like in the past three years – it really pains me to say it but I'm not anybody's champion. If we're perfectly honest, I'm just a regular old _victim_."

Minerva wanted to formulate a response, but his last word and its dejected tone had brutally clenched her throat. So, he continued unimpeded.

"It's like I've been abducted, except I'm still here to see that nobody noticed. As pleasant as it would be to only concern myself with girls and dancing, I can't pretend that everything is fine. Everybody already thinks that I wanted this; I'm already alone in a spotlight which I _know for a fact_ is going to fall on my head and kill me..."

"You're not alone. Your house supports you..." She managed, her voice betraying nothing her emotion.

"I have the support of my house, but only because they want to 'win the Tournament'. My _house_ should be supporting the one who _actually_ represents them. And because of this, they don't. They encourage me, but not in hopes that... not in hope that I live through this ordeal. _They_ have this misguided idea that this is a _game_ and they want to _win_ it. _I_ have this... subtly different idea that this is a _mortal peril_ and I want to _survive_ it. Their cheers don't help with the loneliness I'm afraid, I just feel like a gladiator in the lion pit. And after the stunt I pulled for the first task well... Some are slowly getting it, some are amused by my antics, but most are just angry with me for throwing away what they consider to be a chance."

Minerva's eyes flickered downwards again. Had she been swept up by her own competitive spirit herself?

"My house got caught up in the Tournament as if I were a participant, and you're asking me to do the same; but I'm not a participant. I'm a _hostage_. I need my peers to realise that. I need them to be on the lookout for a metaphorical ransom note."

Minerva stood up, faced the window of her office. Her vision had started to blur, so she discreetly extracted a handkerchief from her pocket and dried her eyes, disguising her gesture as a thoughtful pinch of the bridge of her nose. Behind her, the student she kept failing to protect had more to say.

"I need at least some of them to be on my side... My real side... I don't know what my enemies are up to, but I do know that this is only step one. I need my friends to be ready for step two."

"And you think not attending the ball would do that?"

"I think being reminded that there should only be three couples dancing on that floor might help. And I think when their eyes look for scarred faces and find only Pr. Moody's... Some will think I'm just being cowardly again, I guess, but some may finally realise that... That something is very wrong... But even if you don't think it'll help, it's all I can do to protest... So I have to do it. I have to be a champion for the tasks, but I don't have to be one for the _decorum_. And I'm sorry, but no punishment would make me. Short of forcing me to forfeit my magic or my life, like some archaic goblet."

Minerva was silent for a moment. "No punishment? Even if I were to expel you?" Somehow, she heard his eyes shoot at her with a terrified gleam, and realised that this was poor form on her part. These kind of words didn't just fall out of a Gryffindor's mouth by accident, let alone this one – did she really need to test his resolve? She sighed in defeat even before he started to mumble his "well, er... I... I hope you won't, I really, really do, but–" with a rapidly shattering voice.

"I'm sorry."

Minerva let her apology hang in the conversation for a moment. At first, she had meant for it to cover her mean-spirited test, but as she felt his gaze on her back she let further implications flow silently under it. She had failed him quite thoroughly, after all. She turned back to face him, and sat at her desk.

"Well. Let's discuss a deal, then."

He looked at her quizzically.

"I'll allow you not to attend, as long as you find a date who's willing not to attend with you. And I do mean a _date_. You don't have to dress up, but I expect the both of you to have at least one dance. I can provide music if you need it. That and..."

It was her turn to bite her lip in hesitation. She couldn't believe she was about to suggest what she was about to suggest. She had carried the Yule Ball on her shoulders since long before the school year had begun...

"If this is to be effective... I want you to make it _extremely_ clear that this... That this is in protest rather than shame or cowardice. I don't know how you can convey that message, but... but... As loathe as I am to concede it... maybe..."

Courage, Minerva. She had to stand up for her student, now. If only for penance's sake. Even if she ended up undermining herself, her authority, her work... She rested her forehead on her two pergameneous hands, her elbows planted in her desk, trying very hard to summon a long forgotten youthful house spirit. She finally sighed out a heartbroken sentence which would no doubt cost her a _lot_ :

"Maybe the Weasley twins can help you express this message with sufficient panache."

She looked up at his disbelieving expression as it deepened into a confused frown and an incredulous expression of horrified glee, which she tempered immediately by hissing an _absolute_ caveat.

" _I did_ _ **not**_ _tell you this, and whatever they do will_ _ **not**_ _perturb the ball for more than a_ _ **minute**_ _, nor will it disrupt the opening dance_ _ **at all**_ _for the champions do I make myself clear?_ "

He nodded eagerly. He was particularly grateful that she hadn't said 'the other champions'.

"I want to hear you say it, Mr. Potter."

"No more than a minute, after the opening dance is over. It's all my idea."

She sighed and sat back.

"I suggest you think long and hard about this. I may be required to punish you afterwards..."

He gave her a confused look.

"Appearances have to be kept, Mr. Potter. And by that point, I think you'll agree that you will be in my debt, so to speak." He nodded furiously under her unreadable stare. "On an unrelated note, I think that Animagus training could be construed as an adequate detention for a Transfiguration teacher to give, don't you? Although it would be an exceptionally harsh one: after all, it _is_ excruciatingly difficult. But it can be such an advantage for certain tasks."

Harry couldn't believe what he was hearing. He had known, on some level, that McGonagall was a Gryffindor. He had seen her display the trademark house spirit on occasion, when she had given him a spot on the Quidditch team instead of expelling him for instance... And then his first broom... But never had he expected to see her display these qualities so thoroughly for his sake. She seemed like an older Hermione, down to the steel hard, unwavering support in the face of adversity. He had _never_ felt such gratefulness towards an authority figure. Except maybe Sirius when he had invited him to live with him. She was also comparable to Hermione insofar as she was currently planning furiously, trying to both mitigate and improve her idea with specific instructions, and an impressive display of understanding of in-house sociology.

"I can't know the specifics, of course. Under _no circumstance_ are the Weasley twins to know that I had a say in this matter. If you need an authority to ground them, you may recruit... Miss Bell or Miss Spinnet _..._ No, there's no avoiding it: you may recruit Miss Granger to keep them in line... In which case, you _may_ tell Miss Granger – and _only_ her – about my involvement. But only if you _absolutely need to._ In which case you are to _immediately_ send her to me so that I can impress upon her the importance of secrecy..."

After this, McGonagall hesitated. Harry caught her thoughts on the fly: bringing more people in wasn't safe.

"If Hermione believes me – and that's a big _if;_ I don't know if I'd believe myself – she'd understand. She's the only one who understands me– err... my situation, I mean. I mean she understands the situation I just desc– you know what I mean." His thoughts were somewhat chaotic, but he adapted to her planning process pretty quickly. After all, he had seen it before in his best friend. A thought assaulted him and he had to ask "About that detention..."


	3. Chapter 3

_Okay, full disclosure. Which means long-ass A/N:  
_

 _I didn't even intend to write about the Tasks **at all** for this story, and it would seem that I failed quite spectacularly in that regard.  
_

 _It was supposed to be about the Yule Ball and what led to it. But then I wrote the conversation with McGonagall and I tried to picture this Harry during the first Task: I just couldn't imagine him doing daring acrobatics on a broom... He would have done the reasonable thing and lost on purpose, like a normal human being who just wants to survive. In fact,_ _ _I always wondered why he didn't just do that in canon, so_ I assumed that this idea of losing on purpose had to be pretty mainstream and had probably been done in about a thousand other stories here... So it was just a kind of introduction and ___I still kind of intended for this story to close up shop after the Yule Ball. B_ ut some of the reviews I've gotten ___(for which, and I'll tell you again, thank you a lot)_ seem to indicate a stark interest in what that idea might entail for the future of the Tournament. _

_Which puts me in a difficult position because... Well the second Task is going to require something more drastic, now, isn't it? And what I intended to be a short, kind of romantic little thing is going to turn into this big alternative story with large deviations from canon.  
_

 _All this to give my eternal gratitude for all the reviewers for their interest, and to say that everything weird that happens after chapter 5 is entirely their fault._

 _As much as I usually find Ron unidimensional and detrimental to the narrative flow, I don't believe turning him into a character that's only there to be hated is a very interesting exercise. So I'll at least try to make him more of a balanced character whenever I include him. Also, I may go back to Dursley life too, but it shall be later for I am already afraid of expanding this in too many directions at once.  
_

 _Oh, by the way, Red Phoenix Dragon pointed out that Harry cannot be expelled or detained since he's technically in another school. Truth be told, I hadn't remembered whether that was canon or just a great amount of fics, but I chose not to include it anyway because... Well... it doesn't really make sense, does it? That's just a technicality for the Goblet's sake, but he's still in the school, taking classes... Even if the legal technicality stands, one would assume that in the case of visiting students, schools would have a standard agreement for discipline, putting an end to the visit, etc. So he can at least be detained and expelled (one would expect that in such a case, he would still participate to the tournament but not classes, or he would be kept until next year).  
_

 _Again, Anna241, you have all my gratitude for your timely warning, I think you saved me from an ungodly amount of ridicule. Anyone else who wants to point out my unbelievable blunders or Brit-pick my all-over-the-place literary style, or give me a long Grammar Nazi rant about sentences ending with prepositions, you are more than welcome to do so._

 _Of course, thanks everyone for reading, thank you to those who took the time to review; I hope I don't disappoint you in the future._

* * *

When they were done discussing the in's, the out's, and the absolutely-don't's, after Prof. McGonagall ran out of imperative instructions and threats, Harry exited his teacher's office in a daze. This whole encounter had been sort of surrealistic, but he didn't even have a word to describe its outcome. A feminine voice in his head helped him sort his thoughts: first, he had to find a date for his non-ball. If it had been for the ball, he'd have thought about Cho but this... This was too... intimate. Not only would they have to dance: they'd have to dance _j_ _ust the two of them_. Alone, somewhere in an empty castle. That was somehow more terrifying that in front of everyone else in the Grand Hall. No, it was really too intimate.

Which meant that there was only one possibility, really.

He sprinted through the corridors towards the Griffindor common room. Why did he sprint, you ask? He didn't really know, he was agitated. And he badly needed someone to talk to.

Secondly, he had to devise a prank. He'd need broad strokes before asking the twins for help. It would need to be a prank that said "you're having fun while I'm fearing for my life"? So... Scary? Too dangerous, too reproachful... A prank that said "keep your cup but please help me live through this"? Too pleading... A few ideas were swirling in his head, some were beginning to take form but it was too late: he had arrived. He was panting in front of the whole common room. Everybody was looking at him, as usual. He spotted the twins first. One of them made the beginning of a joke, the other one finished it, he didn't really listen.

"Fred! George!"

They stared at him with a bit of surprise on their identical faces. Harry didn't really know what to tell them. The feminine voice in his head pointed out that it was because he was doing this in the wrong order.

"Nevermind! Hermione!" He looked for a brown bush on a pile of books, but couldn't find one.

"She's in the lib–."

He shut the fat lady behind him, cutting off one of the twins, and started running to the library. So these pranks? Maybe... No that would be really dangerous. Except if you start with a warning shot... And then add a lot of foolishness on top? He'd have to prevent anyone from stopping it. Age lines would be an ironic addition, if he could figure out how to create them. What else? Too late: library. He tumbled through the door again. This time, everybody gave surprised looks and shocked glares at his noisiness. Well everybody always had a good reason to stare at him anyway. The ancient librarian began to form an outraged exclamation, but he spotted Hermione; she had stood up when he had entered, obviously concerned at his agitation, and the rattle of her chair had attracted his attention. The scene was obviously pretty disconcerting for Krum, who was standing next to her, apparently to talk to her. Weird. Well, no time to think about that. He disconcerted his opponent even further when he grabbed Hermione by the hand and led her out briskly with a "sorry" in the general direction of everyone else. During their exit, he heard a whispered "Harry! What–" behind him, but she interrupted herself.

"Mr. Potter, detentio–" too late. He led her to a deserted corridor in silence, trying not to manhandle her despite his incredulous energy. When they arrived to a satisfactory area, he turned to her. This was not going to be easy: the first problem was that she was obviously annoyed at his actions. The second was that he didn't seem to be able to formulate words at her at the moment. He was still panting, still confused, and now he was getting nervous. Her annoyance turned to concern. His nervousness turned to guilt. What he was going to ask of her was a pretty big favour. She had told him she wanted to go to the ball, before... He felt his heart sink before he even started.

"Well? Are you going to tell me what Professor McGonagall said?"

That was a good idea. Start at the beginning. He sat down crossed legged, his back to the wall and she sat beside him. He felt his tongue untie. He told her about the ball, about the champions having to open it. He told her about his argument with McGonagall, about why he didn't want to do that. He ended up retracing the discussion almost verbatim. He described her reactions as best he could, at least the few he had caught. Hermione grasped his arguments one by one, asking as few questions as she could, commiserating more and more as she did. Quite like her favourite teacher had, in fact.

"She asked if I would resist even if she expelled me I mumbled something like a yes" Hermione had already been disheartened by his points, but now she was horrified. He stopped her before she could shout.

"Wait a minute; she just interrupted me and said 'I'm sorry'... I didn't know what she meant. I thought for a second that she was actually going to expel me, but then – calm down, she didn't, don't worry... Then... She just... She just looked so sad..."

There was a pause.

"I think... I think she feels guilty about this whole mess..."

"...Do you blame her?"

"What? No! She wasn't even... It's clearly not her fault but I think she feels responsible for me. And for the way the rest of the house treated the issue."

They contemplated again.

"I think she's... She's a genuinely good person." He concluded.

Hermione smiled at this, and poked at his newfound respect for her favourite teacher. "So will you stop forgetting the 'Professor', when you speak about her, now?"

"Actually, after the rest of what she said I'm thinking I'll call her 'Auntie Minnie' and give her a hug before every class."

" _Have you gone completely mad?_ "

He laughed at her exaggerated horror.

"Seriously... Not even as a joke, Harry. What could she have said that would elicit such an amorous response?"

"A few things. Some of which I swore to secrecy... But I'll tell you everything I can. First off, there is possibly a secret plot to give me Animagus training. I can't tell you anymore about this at this time without betraying her confidence. Also may I stress that this is a _secret_ plot?" There was a succession of several reactions to that. First, her eyes widened, then she made a gesture of zipping her lips closed. She gave him a quick congratulatory hug, then a pout.

"I'm jealous."

"Of course you are. Oh, don't give me that face, d'you think I've met you yesterday? She said that depending on the outcome, it may be possible to include you. I couldn't get anything more certain than that."

This time he got a _grateful_ hug, which he had always found to be way more pleasant anyway.

"The second thing..." he started after they were done, but his nervousness threatened to come back.

" _Right_! The ball? What did she say?"

He took a deep breath and explained. Bit by bit. He actually repeated everything two or three times in different terms, trying to stall. In the end she teased him by repeating it herself.

"So let me make sure I understand: you need to ask someone who'd be okay with not going to the ball?"

"Yes." He didn't realise she was mocking him right away.

"And dance with her all alone?"

This time he noticed her smirk "Yes. Are you quite done? I'm actually feeling quite nervous about it...".

"I can see that. Do you have someone in mind, yet?"

"...Yes..."

He couldn't hide his doubts during the following pause: "Well go on, then. Why so hesitant?" He sighed.

"I feel kind of bad asking her _not_ to go."

She thought about it for a second "Yeah, it's tricky."

"I mean not only am I asking her, which is already kind of putting us both on the spot, but I'm instantly asking her to choose between me and the ball..."

"You shouldn't look at it that way."

"Well.. Don't you?"

"Not really. Well... Let me put it this way: do you fancy her?"

He swallowed his next breath wrong and got caught into a startled coughing fit. She tapped his back gently with an amused smile.

"...Should I take that as a 'yes', or..."

"*cough* No! *cough* I mean, not 'no'..."

"not no is usually yes." All this was very amusing to her. For now, though. Se would probably be quite cross next, as he realised with horror.

"Yes, but I mean I don' know!"

She chuckled in disbelief "She's your first choice, but you 'don't know' if you fancy her?"

" _Don't take_ _my coughing_ _as any_ _answer_ _, please!_ "

"You don't want to tell me?" She was still amused, but getting kind of puzzled at his reticence. During her next sentence, her expression slowly became suspicious, and he almost saw the pieces click together in her mind in slow motion:

"why wouldn't you want to t–"

"Forgetaboutit!" He stood up. "The whole thing. Forget I said anything." He started receding slowly, but as he did he saw a few more pieces clicking behind her eyes. Three pieces in particular: one was entitled 'he didn't even tell me her name', one said 'so why does it matter that _I_ don't know _this_ tidbit' and the last one 'out of all the things we've shared with each other'. The combination of which really had only one possible conclusion. Time stopped. She was going to get it, now, there was no escape.

He had to beat her to it.

"Hermione"

Calling her name bought him half a second, as she lifted her thoughtful gaze to meet his. He sat back in front of her.

"Would you do me the immense honour of not going to the ball with me?"

Her thoughtful frown disappeared and her mouth opened very slowly as the rest of the pieces slammed into place. Her mouth shut and her frown reappeared for a different reason.

"That's a really sneaky way to ask!"

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean it!" He kneeled in front of her in a begging pose "I was really nervous and it sort of just happened..." He looked up at her "You're the one I usually confide in and, well I needed your advice... except you happened to also be the recipient and... I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to." That seemed to placate her a bit.

"So. Does that mean you fancy me?"

He looked at her, terrified. He opened his mouth to form an answer and only managed to get out a pained squeak.

"Just kidding. Consider this my revenge. I might ask you again, during... in the future."

"...Does that mean..."

"Just answer me this, first. Why me?"

He took his former place by her side and looked at the stone wall pensively.

"Well first of all you're my best friend. Then... You're the only girl I'd feel sorta comfortable... dancing alone with..."

There was a pause after that. He wanted to look at her expression but didn't quite feel up to the task. Eventually he heard her speak with a smiling voice "With whom."

"What?" He finally turned to face her. She was indeed smiling.

"'You're the only girl _'with whom'_ I'd feel comfortable dancing alone.' Don't end a sentence on a preposition, whenever possible."

"Oh. Okay, I'll... I'll try to remember that."

"It's not always possible, mind you. For example, 'This is the sort of English _up with which_ I will not put' doesn't work."

"...Right."

She let him stew for a bit, savouring his nervousness. She wondered if she should bring up the concept of extraneous prepositions, but concluded that he'd had enough.

"You... I mean... I wouldn't resent you for saying no or anything. I know you wanted to go, but I... I mean... I guess it's a big thing to ask and you've already done so much for me... You don't have to–"

"Of course I'll not go with you, silly."

He spun around and was about to hug her, but hesitated at her wording. She rolled her eyes.

"Yes! I'm saying yes."

This time he threw himself at her unreservedly. They almost fell on the floor.

"And I'll be happy to, it's not a favour at all. But let me impress upon you, Mr. Potter, that you do _in fact_ need to dress up. I know _I_ will, and you don't want to make your date feel foolish and overdressed, now, do you? We may not go to the ball, but I expect to feel like a princess all the same."

He couldn't stop his surprised laughter in time. She pushed him away and shot him a glare, so he had to ask:

"You really want to feel like a princess?"

She thought about it as they got up. "You know what, you're right. That's too girly. I expect to feel like a queen."

She left him there, smugly satisfied at his speechlessness. The queen had a Quidditch-super-star-stroke-Triwizard-champion to let down.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** _A bit of a short one today. I'll make it up with the next one._

 _Thanks everyone for your continued support and advice. I'll try to integrate your suggestions in the flow of this story. I'm really happy to see that my little story seems to be generally well received. Be certain that I take all advice into account, even if you can't always modify what's already written (and I do have a bit of a backlog).  
_

 _My mistreatment of Ronald two chapters ago seems to have had a bit of repercussions; I must say that I actually tried to make him at least partially relatable, admitting his jealousy, bringing up ambiguous but somewhat valid points... It's a bit hard to do because the view he holds at this point in the story is already universally hated, but I want you to know I tried. He won't have the most important presence in the rest of the story, but I'll try to keep him balanced when he does appear. Also, I'm kind of dreading the prank now. I hope I don't disappoint all these high expectations. Well I've got a bit of time to make it better anyway.  
_

 _Enjoy! Or don't. If you don't, tell me why! If you do too!_

 _And as always, it isn't mine I'm just borrowing it._

* * *

"Excuse-me?" Harry wondered for a second if Hermione had consciously picked up Prof. McGonagall's intonations.

"I need your help with a prank." He repeated. Her mouth opened and closed a few times as she walked beside him. She finally settled on an appropriate response.

"Have you _met_ me?"

"Yes, I know. But it's a special prank and it's special help." Hermione looked at him, her eyes full of disbelief, wondering what would lead Harry to think she'd participate in such a thing.

"Okay, I'll bite. What's so special about it?"

"It..." He made a show of looking around them and whispered to her even though they were alone in the corridor.

"It's a special order. By a teacher."

"...I don't believe you." She wouldn't be roped into his games, so she didn't bother to whisper. He got closer anyway and spoke even lower.

"Prof. McGonagall told me to do it." He whispered again. She pushed him away and wagged an accusatory finger in his face.

"That is the stupidest and most blatant lie I have _ever_ heard! And I've met _Malfoy_." He pushed her index finger with his in a caricature of a fencing motion, billowing his cape behind him as he pretended to disarm her before poking her lightly in the ribs. She flinched. He gave a traditional fencing salute as she smacked him behind the head.

"When she agreed to let me skip the Ball, she said I had to show that it was in _protest_. It was one of the things I agreed not to tell anyone"

"That... is flimsy at best, and not at all probable as justifications go. And why are you telling me this _now_ if it's a secret, in that fantasy land of yours?"

"She told me to bring you in, if I needed to keep the prank from spiralling out of control under the Twins' slightly psychotic supervision. I must admit that I had no illusions that I would need you eventually."

"That..."

Hermione was at a loss. That... That did seem like a logical... No... No, that was just her pride speaking. That manipulative prat! Trying to appeal to her love for control and rules to coax her into breaking them! Unforgivable. Devious. A bit impressive.

"Nice try!" She suddenly noticed where they seemed to be walking towards "Where are we going?" He didn't answer, but she blanched when they stopped in front of a certain teacher's office. He knocked.

"Professor McGonagall? I've brought Miss Granger, as per your request." he was trying and failing to repress a teasing singsong voice as he looked straight at her expression. Or rather at her expressions: her face shifted to a new emotion every second: anger, humour, curiosity, fear, hope, despair...

"Enter."

He opened the door and gestured her in. She had finally decided to settle into a petrified, wide-eyed stare. Eventually, he had to actually push her in, and didn't follow after her. She felt like her world was about to crumble. This _had_ to be some sort of joke. Or rather it had _not_ to be...

Harry waited patiently for her to exit the office. She was livid when she did, so he took her arm and they walked back slowly. After a few minutes of silence she spoke.

"I still don't believe it."

"I know, right?"

There was a pause after that. Harry tried to guess how such a conversation could have gone.

"Did you ask her to turn into a cat to prove her identity?" Hermione almost slapped herself in the face.

"Oh _god_! I did... And she complied, too... So it isn't Polyjuice, but she could still be Imperiused..."

"Hermione. That would be _way_ too big for a prank."

"I know... And what she said... Sort of made sense."

"She's just a genuinely good person, and she's trying to help me turn the tides of public opinion..."

"Yeah..."

"And she has all those requirements for it to be safe and not too long or disruptive..."

"Yeah..."

"So will you help me keep the Twins in line? And maybe make the prank harder, faster, stronger and safer?"

"...Well I _have to_ , now..."

He stopped and gave her a warm hug. She was still a bit dazed but he felt her get better in his arms. He actually felt a bit guilty to have shaken up her perception of authority so violently... He knew that order was important to her; she trusted them to be there, and to be absolute. As much as she broke her own rules on his behalf it was probably the first time that she witnessed rules breaking themselves... He couldn't let her feel that disoriented.

"You know I would be completely lost without you, right?"

He felt her cheek tense a bit against his as she smiled, and her hands come to rest against his back "I know."

* * *

"Mr. Potter, a word."

The rest of the class was exiting in a more or less orderly fashion, and Hermione gave him a complicated look over her shoulder as he approached Prof. McGonagall's desk. They waited for the door to close after the last student.

"Do you have a date?"

"Yes."

"Do you have anything to play music?"

"No."

"Come with me."

He followed her to her office in silence, wondering idly what wizards listened to music on. 'What wizard used to listen to music', he corrected himself. He was surprised, as they entered, to find what appeared to be a simple gramophone sitting on her desk. She gestured for him to sit, and did the same opposite of him. He couldn't look away from the ancient jumble of brass and wood. He had always loved gramophones. His teacher broke the silence.

"You're aware, I suspect, that I taught your mother a few years ago."

He looked back at her inquisitively and a bit taken aback. He hadn't expected his mother to be part of this conversation.

"In her seventh year, we had a conversation about music and how it can be recorded and played. Wizards directly transfigure sound in solid or magical form and duplicate it to play it, you see. I knew muggles had different contraptions, but I couldn't understand how one could trap something as... ethereal as music without the use of magic. She tried to explain, but I'm afraid I didn't understand... When she graduated, she left me this as a present. With a letter."

She opened a drawer from the wooden base of the gramophone, where one could fit a few records in their colourful jackets. There was indeed a pile of records: the upper one was a blue Charlie Parker with a drawing of a yellow bird playing the saxophone.

On top of it was a yellowed parchment covered with neat, loopy handwriting in blue ink.

He gulped in apprehension.

She handed him the letter.

He took it and scrutinised her expression. She raised her eyebrow to indicate that he should read it instead.

He felt his eyes resist a bit, then settle on the parchment. He read it.

 _Dear Prof. McGonagall,_

 _This last year was as amazing as the six that came before, in large part thanks to you. I'm fairly certain that your office is already teeming with gifts from former students, but I fow Ines dnreug..._

He raised his blurry eyes at her, careful not to let them drip: "Do you have a tissue? Thank you." Really, now. Not even two sentences in... Not very manly.

 _I'm fairly certain that your office is already teeming with gifts from former students, but I saw this during my easter holidays, and after our discussion about recording music I just had to give it to you._

 _This magnificent piece of muggle technology is called a 'gramophone'. Isn't it beautiful? It's a very old mechanism, practically an antique now. Of course we have better, newer ways to reproduce music but I just love these old things and their wobbly sound._

 _I'll tell you how to operate it, and leave you to try and guess how it works. The music is stored on the black discs. To play it, you should take one out of its protective square of paper, and put it on the rotating table; it'll start to turn as you bring the needle carefully to rest on its surface. You can change the rotational speed with the dial on the side. I charmed the discs to make them scratch-proof and the needle to better adapt its weight to the disc, all in the interest of better conservation. But apart from that it's all muggle ingenuity._

 _I hope your had as much fun as I did during the past seven years, and I hope the rest of your career in Hogwarts will be as filled with marvel as this last year was for me._

 _Best Regards,_

 _Lily Evans_

 _PS: I apologise for my boyfriend's rowdy behaviour._

Harry kept his eyes on the letter for a long time after he was finished reading it. He didn't know what to say to his teacher, so he stalled by studying in minute detail his mother's handwriting, and committing to memory as many sentences as he could. "I just love these old things and their wobbly sound" and "I apologise for my boyfriend's rowdy behaviour" were immediately rehearsed, stored, and filed for further reference, never to be forgotten. Neither should the calligraphy of her name. He tried to mentally reproduce it, studying the gesture behind it. Really, how many loops can you fit in "Lily Evans"? He counted. Twelve...

He was a bit surprised to find that she still called muggles 'we' even in her seventh year. He thought he should remember to do that too.

He eventually had to hand it back to her.

"I have no doubt that you can guess how precious this object is to me."

He nodded.

"But I can only imagine how important any object related to your parentage would be to you. I'll lend it to you for your non-ball. And occasionally afterwards, if you want."

He nodded again and cleared his throat of the few knots who had settled in it, before finally feeling up to the task of saying a raspy "Thank you."

"The selection of discs is also hers" She extracted the small pile of records and laid the six of them in front of Harry. "Do you recognise any of the artists?"

"Some." Charlie Parker, Django Reinhardt, Prokofiev, Chopin, Pink Floyd, and the Turtles. That was also worth knowing by heart. He rehearsed it mentally a few times until it was imprinted in his memory.

"I'll... I'll leave you here to listen to them."

There was a pause. She got up and walked to the door. Before exiting her office, she turned back to him.

"Do you know how the sound is stored and produced? I never could figure it out."

"A bit. I'm sure Hermione could explain it better, though... Professor?" He turned to her and got up from his chair. He had to clear his throat again as she waited for him to speak.

"Do you have some of her... some of their old essays?"

She thought about it for a second.

"I'll look for them in my archives and ask other professors if they're willing to do the same."

She opened the door, but he stopped her with another "Professor." She turned to him again.

"Thank you."

She hesitated a bit, nodded and left him alone in her office. The entire corridor felt out of place. Or maybe it was her.

Well. Off to the kitchens for a cup of tea before dinner.

In there, she found Hermione talking with house elves, handing out pamphlets. She made sure her appearance was as stern as usual. A house elf gave her a cup before she could even ask for it, proving Miss Granger's efforts to be rather fruitless at the moment.

"Miss Granger." She turned to face her student who seemed surprised to find a professor here. "Would you have time to explain to me how _gramophones_ work?"

Hermione complied, a bit confused. It's simple after all: the groove goes up and down mimicking the waveform, the needle's motion thusly guided on the disk brings analogous vibrations to a membrane, the vibration is amplified in the brass cone producing sound. Later, Hermione wondered why she couldn't find Harry at dinner.


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N: Gosh darn that was a long chapter to write. And I still want to change so much stuff... But let's not dawdle, it's never going to be perfect and I'm never going to publish if I keep forgetting that the better is the enemy of the good... That's what reviews are for! Telling me all the better ways I could've gone about it._

 _About the lack of British music... don't believe what you'll read here: it wasn't intentional at all. I totally forgot. Well, not totally: I distinctly remember speaking out loud to my computer screen, saying 'well the Beatles would be way too obvious, now, wouldn't they'. That was about the extent of my thoughts on the matter..._

 _To all those who took the time to review, thank you for your support! It was a particularly nice feeling to find the lines I'm most proud of being quoted as favourites.  
_

 _As always, I hereby disclaim whatever you want me to.  
_

 _Well... here goes._

* * *

Harry set the gramophone on a chair in the middle of the deserted courtyard. He erected a few protective barriers around it to deflect snowflakes, and prevent any accident he could imagine. He admired it for a second. He felt like he had forgotten something. Of course: he took out the shield preventing him to touch it, put Prokofiev on and raised the protections again. He had checked that there was a Waltz on it: Cinderella's Waltz... It played heavily on somewhat jarring harmonies, but he liked it. It gave a sort of anxious vibe to the whole fairy tale idea, which was pretty close to what he was feeling right now. It wouldn't come right away, though: it was part of a half-hour long suite. He still felt like he had forgotten something...

"Oh god! Hermione's going to kill me..."

"Why would I kill you?"

Harry turned back and was met with the sight of a young woman walking towards him in a breathtaking blue gown. Cornflower, Lavender, Periwinkle, white peach, one Alizarin, two chestnuts and some sculpted rosewood on top. This girl couldn't have been Hermione, she was too different. For example, she had shoulders. Well Hermione had to have shoulders too... Huh. Funny how you can know someone for four years and never see their shoulders. Only bushy brown hair falling in fluid bundles of perfect sinusoidal chaos, hiding most of her upper body... This woman had a complicated hairdo instead. Smooth, silky loops flowing gently around her ears into threaded knots and circular braids instead of her usual thin strands tumbling down and radiating everywhere like a dark, sunny cascade. Hm. So these were Hermione's shoulders, then? Well nice to meet you, Hermione's shoulders; I didn't expect you to be naked the first time we'd meet. He had to say something, now; he'd been silent for a long while.

"... Blimey, Hermione; I don't know if you feel like a queen yet, but you sure do look like one." That was technically 'something'. Maybe next time he would find something better.

"Pfft... Sure, sure, very smooth, Harry." she nonchalantly waved his compliment away "If a bit on the cheesy side, maybe. But why shall I murder you today, if I may reiterate?"

"Later, later. You can kill me in about twenty minutes."

"Hmm..." She visibly repressed a shiver "I can't help but notice the venue you've chosen is covered in snow."

"Yes. But I've found a very useful spell – you'll never guess where."

"I don't know, where?" He pointed his wand at her chest. Hello cleavage, nice to meet you too... Oops, let's not stare too much, shall we?

"In a book. _Aputcalor_."

She rolled her eyes "I'm proud of you." Her skin, clothes and complicated hairdo glowed with a reddish tint two or three times before settling on her usual hue, and letting her upper body relax in the sudden warmth.

"It's a warming charm used by Inuit mages." He suddenly threw a bit of snow in her direction, she squealed in horror and tried to protect herself with her naked arms. The snow felt lukewarm to the touch and slid off her easily without melting. Her clothes weren't even wet.

"Harry!... One doesn't throw snow at a queen! That spell is amazing, though..."

"Isn't it? The book said it doesn't actually warm up, but just 'regulates outgoing heat exchanges with inorganic matter', or something. I've always wanted to have a picnic in the snow, but the cold and wet aspects would make the fulfilment of this particular fantasy quite disappointing, now, wouldn't they..."

"Well thank goodness the second law of thermodynamics is so lax, then. Should've called it the second _guideline_ of thermodynamics, really. Entropy, schmentropy, etc. Have you actually brought a picnic basket?"

"I have. Well... Just tea, really. I figured we've both already eaten." He started to lay a sheet on the ground. White on white. It was hard to discern, especially with their strange new perceptions of temperature. The warm snow crunched comfily under them as they sat. Hermione took care to gather her intricate gown around her and on top of the sheet. Oh, there was an actual cornflower pinned to her bodice. Should the entire bodice be called a 'corsage' then? Or just the flower? And should he stare so much?

"So that's not why I'll kill you, then? Is something wrong with the prank?"

"The prank is fine. Fred and George have it well in hand, everything is ready. No." He sighed. " Since you really want to know..." He timidly plunged his hand in the immaculate cloudy mattress around them. He let his ear wander to Prokofiev for a second. The waltz part was a long way away.

"Between this non-ball with you, the next task I don't know anything about, the prank... I sorta forgot to learn how to dance."

She snickered once. Twice. It escalated until she was fully laughing at him. He catapulted more snow at her.

"Eep! Harry! Don't... do that."

She started laughing again.

"You, don't do that!" He protested; she calmed herself

"Sorry... You have to admit it's pretty funny."

"Well I'm happy you're taking it that way because your feet sure won't find it amusing in few minutes."

"Oh, Harry... We can just tell her we danced if you like."

"Excuse me? Are you seriously proposing that we lie to a teacher?"

She shrugged. Hello again, shoulders.

"I guess being paradoxically _ordered to subvert_ has had a peculiar influence on me." She exhaled an exaggerated sigh "I don't know what to think anymore... God is dead, so to speak."

"Who? Oh, you mean _McGonnagod_?" Her head tilted back slightly when she laughed, showing her thin, smooth throat. He had never noticed she did that.

Yes, McGonnagod is dead, exactly... Oh, no... That felt very, very wrong to say... I still have a long way on the road to becoming an _Überwitch_ , it seems. Speaking of venturing into the uncharted waters _Beyond Good and Evil_ , the prank should be starting soon, shouldn't it?"

She turned her head to listen for the music coming from the great hall, a few corridors away. Hello, nape of Hermione's neck, nice to meet you also. A woman's bare neck has a particular nakedness to it when her hair is up. It's somehow more naked than shoulders or arms. It may be because of the soft curls almost caressing it as they bounce lightly behind her every move.

He tried to listen for the Ball too.

* * *

A sudden, eery hush fell on the Great Hall, and Minerva started her mental stopwatch. The music had been silenced, as had been almost everyone in the Hall. An animated cartoonish drawing of a small hooded figure with an enormous masked face had appeared in the middle of the dance floor. The paper figure started talking in a screeching high, ridiculous voice, which was very audible in the complete silence.

"Hello! It's me! Jasper the friendly Death Eater."

The darkness of the introduction was dispelled somewhat by the ridicule of the caricature. A few teachers sprung into action – Severus first – but the room-wide silencing spell and the confused crowd were impeding them. She cast a silent _finite incantatem_ for good measure, which bounced harmlessly on an invisible surface around the ridiculous figure, who kept talking unimpeded.

"You may remember us from the Quidditch world cup. Right? We showed everyone we were still around? With the dark mark?"

The figure raised a cartoonish, suspiciously phallic wand and a childish drawing of a green skull appeared above it. Instead of a snake coiling around it and protruding from it's mouth, there was a rabbit humping an eye-socket, its hind paw resting uneasily on the skull's lower teeth and threatening to slip awkwardly with every other thrust. Severus tried to run towards the living drawing, but was unceremoniously stopped by what was very clearly the same sort of age line that Albus had put around the cup. Of course the cartoon had to draw attention to that fact:

"Sorry, lad: you're too old to cross that line. Don't worry I'll just be a minute."

This was quickly turning to be one of the most complicated pranks she had ever seen. The again, she only had herself to blame. Bringing together the Twins, the Brightest Witch of her Generation and the offspring of a Marauder...

"This is just a friendly reminder that my friends and I are still taking advantage of this friendly competition to attempt to murder one of your friends! You know that the easiest way to sneak his name in the cup would be to impersonate someone who could, right? So maybe one of my friends is still here dancing with you! But have fun with your friendly ball!"

It folded into a pretty recognisable origami of the Goblet of fire, which bounced up and down firing papers planes at everyone. Minerva caught one of the papers and unfolded it: it read 'You get to fight a mother dragon or lose your magic! Yay!'. Severus had finally dismantled the age line and was trying to catch the offending cup, while Filius cast vanishing charms at as many paper planes as he could. Eventually the cup burned out of existence by itself, and the papers on the ground were vanished.

Spelling it out for the audience, huh? Not very subtle, and a bit dark... That 'a death eater amongst us' idea was pretty far-fetched – especially with a former Auror teaching here –, but it could maybe plant the seeds of wariness in these young minds. They did look pretty anxious all of a sudden. The prank itself had lasted about 40 seconds by Minerva's count, but the awkward silence seemed to last much longer. Maybe the silencing spell was still in effect? That was definitely one of the most magically impressive parts of the whole thing. When the minute was over, Minerva decided to break the silence herself by opening the doors and calling pretty loudly.

"Potter? Granger?"

There was a slight ruffle as everyone's head turned to look at her, then a small voice echoed from apparently far away in the empty castle.

"Yes?"

"Detention every Saturday until the end of the school year!"

A whisper coursed through the Hall and the same voice responded.

"...Okay."

She turned to the musicians and nodded. People started dancing timidly again. The Weasley twins were acting as angelic as she had ever seen them. Severus was striding towards her with murder in his eyes.

"They should be expelled! Potter would be a hassle but at least Granger–" She didn't falter, and didn't let her gaze cross his.

"I can't even prove that they're responsible, Severus. Although we both know they're the only ones who hold that particular view... Let's just be happy they didn't challenge me for evidence. After all, it _seems_ impossible to pull off for two fourth years who weren't even at the scene."

"At least let me have the detention. It'll be worse for them if I–"

"Oh don't worry, my detention will be harsher than you can possibly imagine. The Yule Ball has been my project since it was announced, after all."

He eyed her suspiciously and left, his robes billowing after him in rough whipping motions.

It was Filius's turn to approach her. He was more flabbergasted than angry.

"That Granger girl is quite something, huh?" He started disbelievingly.

"I think she's had help for this. And Potter is no joke either... But yes."

"That silencing charm... On a whole room? It shouldn't even be possible..."

"I was wondering about that myself. Maybe they have hidden runes on the walls here. Should we look for them?"

They started to stroll around the Great Hall, examining the walls and floors, discussing the magical components of the prank. Most of the papers holding the runes had self-destroyed. More accurately, they had been purposefully overpowered and had burned up. They were able to reconstruct one or two after recruiting a rather impressed professor Babbling: it was a high pass filter, silencing everything under a certain frequency. So they could have spoken, but in a similarly unnatural high voice as the drawing...

The reversed age line was also an impressive feat. Probably the twins' contribution. They had researched the subject extensively, after all...

Transfiguring a living cartoon would take a lot of time, but making it talk... Maybe it was pre-recorded? Transfigured from a howler?

Overall, the postmortem on the prank concluded that Miss. Granger had certainly had the help of some sixth or seventh year. Either that or she was even more impressive than they had thought. Moreover a lot of what they did couldn't have been done remotely.

"Well, maybe they were here. After all, I'm sure you're aware of Mr. Potter's insufferable heirloom?" Better think that than point at the twins. She would _not_ give them Animagus training.

* * *

When Harry and Hermione were done laughing and congratulating each other, they shared a warm cup of tea.

"I said it somewhat stupidly earlier but I meant it: you look amazing. How have you managed that with your hair?"

"Something called Sleekeasy's hair potion. In a rather large quantity, I might add." She sipped a distinguished sip of her tea. "I researched it upon witnessing its unrivalled effectiveness at unraveling my capillary quandaries; I discovered it's apparently been invented by an ancestor of yours, which..."

she pointed to his unruly mop with a teasing smile.

"...makes sense." He flustered a bit. It only encouraged her, unfortunately.

"So..." She started, a smug smirk discreetly invading her expression. "Does this..." She gestured to their surroundings "...mean you fancy me?" She sipped her tea through her feigned haughtiness.

He flustered a bit more at her teasing... then stopped. Who was he kidding? He had kept track of his thoughts so far. Conversing with body parts? Repeatedly? ' _soft curls almost caressing_ _her neck_ _as they_ _bounced_ _lightly behind her every move?_ _'_

"Right now, I genuinely think I do."

She strangled herself trying not to spit tea all over her immaculate gown. Harry handed her a napkin and tapped her back like she had in that corridor a few weeks before.

"Well that one backfired, didn't it?"

She looked at him with a suspicious gleam of pure hatred in her eye, and spoke in a raspy voice.

"Did you say that just to make me cough?"

"No! That would be unbelievably mean! It was just a happy coincidence." He got up and gave her his hand. "Come on, let's just forget I said anything and I'll try not to crush your feet." The waltz was beginning. She gave him a strange look but eventually took his hand. The music crackled like a fire under the gramophone's needle. She gave him a few instruction to begin with, and he caught on pretty fast. Waltzes are easy that three steps. And again. Still the same, but then turn. There you are: not that hard, is it now? You're alright; but don't look at your feet. And I'm sure you can count in your head...

Eventually, he did almost step on her toe. He didn't put any weight on it, but as he almost lost his balance and had to interrupt the dance, she saw an opportunity to throw snow in his face. So she did: she felt vindictive all of a sudden. Of course, he immediately retaliated; but it didn't take him long to realise that Hermione's outfit was a significant hindrance in this sort of battle.

"Mmh... I think as a gentleman, I should forfeit despite my obvious advantage."

" _Obvious advantage_?" She whipped out her wand.

* * *

The white picnic sheet was flying gently, following the whims of an unseen breeze as it descended from the stars. It spiralled downwards slowly, until it rested on someone's lying form.

Hermione's hand shot up and pulled the offending fabric away from her panting figure. She had managed not to ruin her gown, but her hairdo had suffered heavy casualties. Oh, well. it only had taken her three hours. As she lay comfortably on top of the lukewarm snow in a puddle of periwinkle silk and flowing brown hair, her breathing calmed down until it synchronised with the pseudo-periodic crackles and clicks of the empty gramophone. She sat up and reviewed her surroundings. The courtyard had been thoroughly thrashed. Exploded snowballs decorated the walls and stone columns, the previously immaculate coat of powdery whiteness was now criss-crossed with scars and large gaps, revealing blueish pads of frozen grass. The chair in the center was eerily untouched. Harry was lying motionless where she had left him: face down, half buried in a pile of overturned snow a few feet away from her. She wasn't cold, but the spluttering gramophone made her long for the warm comfiness of the common room fireplace.

Harry stood up with some difficulty, and put the still rotating disc away. She saw him review the other coloured squares before putting them all back in the wooded drawer. He took the large silver plate he had previously used to serve the tea, and put the gramophone on it; it disappeared with a slight _plop_.

"Where did you find a gramophone?"

He gave her a strange look and didn't answer right away. First he helped her up and brushed the remaining snow from them both. They started walking back to the Griffindor dorms. He hesitated, and eventually opted for humour. It would have worked better if his smile had reached his eyes.

"It's Auntie Minnie's." She shot him a playfully horrified glare. She didn't understand why the following pause felt so uncomfortable until he told her that it had been his mother's gift.

"...It's nice of her to lend it to you..."

"Yeah."

"... So, the music..." She let the question hang.

"Yeah."

Hermione hesitated a bit, and suddenly decided that she wanted her best friend to be able to speak to her about his mother. "She had good taste. I like Prokofiev." She tried to speak in her usual quick tone and purposeful intonations, as if to say 'this is normal, we've always done this.' He gave her a rather long, incomprehensible look before speaking tentatively.

"I hadn't ever heard of him before... The others are Chopin, Charlie Parker, Django Reinhardt, Pink Floyd and the Turtles." He recited.

"She had really good taste, then... Weird that there's nothing from Britain, isn't it?" She tried her best not to let her awkwardness show.

"I... McGonagall told me she thinks my Mum bought the whole set during a vacation in France."

"Oh. I guess that explains some of her selection..."

She didn't know what to say next... Maybe she should change the subject after all?

Fortunately for her, her plot had already worked and the sluice gates were opening. He started recounting the whole discussion with McGonagall, tentatively at first. The letter... He knew the letter by heart, but pretended he didn't when he summed it up for her. When he hesitated afterwards, she told him about Prof. McGonagall asking her about gramophones in the kitchens, describing her confusion and the nostalgic cloud which had overcome her professor's eyes during Hermione's thorough explanation.

He told her that during that dinner, he had listened to every disc twice and read his mother's letter over and over and over. He described what each song felt like. She was surprised to find that he was quite the poet, when he wanted to describe his actual emotions. Which wasn't nearly often enough. He told her about the terrifying fairy tale in Cinderella – which was why he had chosen it for tonight – about Echoes and the torn veil of a nostalgia for a time he didn't remember, about the furious playfulness of Parker and Reinhardt, about the happy teenage love of the Turtles, and about where the shadow of his mother fit in each of them. Crying to _'happy together_ ' has a particularly bittersweet taste, as everyone and their cat knows. Somewhere along the way, Hermione had expressed her relief that _'Echoes'_ meant her favourite teacher hadn't been subjected to _'the Wall'_ , which would have probably killed the poor Professor after the second double negative. That made him smile. He imagined that was what his father had intended, but his mother wouldn't have it. He flew over his few other memories. He spoke of her plea to Voldemort and following demise too quickly to let Hermione express her horror, because he just wanted to speak about the voice he imagined when he read the letter. He painted what she had looked like in the mirror three years prior, and the whole seven years of school life he had imagined for her just from what was written in that blue, loopy ink...

He spoke fast and jumped from subject to subject. Her head was spinning when he suddenly stopped his diatribe and caught her in a hug that threatened to squeeze the living daylight out of her. That was usually her job... He had been unusually hugsy this last few months. Not that she complained. Then he thanked her. She wasn't really sure why, she had just been walking in quasi-total silence beside him for a while, listening to what he had to say. She realised they were near the fat lady's corridor.

When they entered the deserted common room, she hugged him quickly and tentatively kissed his cheek before climbing the stairs two by two.

She came back down in her pyjamas after a quick shower. He was waiting on the couch, similarly attired, in front of the fire. She sat beside him. The atmosphere was still a bit heavy, but the pause and change of clothes had relieved some of her tension. She looked at her humid, silky curls reflecting the flickering lights of the fire, a bit frustrated that her unruly mane would certainly be back the next morning. Or maybe as soon as they dried completely... A thought assaulted her.

"So..." She started before she could stop herself, still looking at her hair. "... are these the reason you suddenly fancied me, earlier?" There was a pause as they both let the fire's red lights dance around their eyes.

"Well, I can't deny that being introduced to your neck and shoulders played an instrumental role in my epiphany. But apart from that, no. It does look heavenly, though. 'Gotta get me some o' that potion."

"Do you have some kind of weird 'neck and shoulder' fetish?"

"I don't think so. I guess I just meant that you're beautiful; I think it just took seeing you in a different light for it to properly register in my brain."

She didn't know what to respond to that. He continued hurriedly, obviously trying to keep her from taking this in a fictional wrong way he had suddenly imagined. His anxious tone was kind of cute.

"I mean... we were mostly kids when we met... And I guess we still are a bit... and _girls_ haven't been a concern of mine for very long, so it did take me a while to realise... well... to grasp the scope of your... uh..." He was searching for the appropriate word. She knew words.

"Muliebrity?" She offered, turning to him. He was already facing her, chuckling softly with a hand scratching the back of his head.

"I think I'm just going to trust you on that one. So you're beautiful _and_ you're my best friend which means I already sort of love you anyway..." She didn't usually think of herself as a blushing maiden – at least not as much as _he_ was – but that was a lot to take without reddening at all. And he kept rambling on, as if that wasn't already too much. "I mean that's sort of why I asked you in the first place, right? Not that I didn't imagine... I... or that I did, for that matter... And you're not just my best friend, by the way... Lately you've kind of been _the best friend I could ever imagine_. What with you sticking with me and saving my hide over and over despite... I'm saying the word 'friend' too much, aren't– "

This was never going to end. Thankfully, he finally shut up when she kissed him.

* * *

Her brain turned back on somewhat. Just enough to know what she was doing, not enough to actually have a say about it. She let her closed lips hover just in front of his, and let out slow breaths which would certainly tickle his cheek. She kept her eyes closed and her arms crossed behind his neck. After a few infinite seconds there was a rush around her as his lips finally closed the infinitesimal gap, his hands gliding to the sides of her waist to bring her closer.

She ended up kneeling on top of the couch seat at his side, which put her head higher than his. He kept pulling her closer... When their lips had no choice but to disconnect, she took his head in an embrace against her chest and let whatever was spinning between her temples slow down, painfully aware of her own heartbeat against his ear. She ran a hand through his messy hair and gasped as one of his climbed on her back with a shudder-inducing pressure, making her back arch as it raised her shirt bit by bit. She managed to pull him out of her embrace before this went too far, letting him untwist his body by bringing a leg to rest on the couch's cushion between them. She pushed him back until he was lying against the comfy armrest, and laid her temple on his upper chest, her body half-covering his. She listened to the fire protest their inappropriateness with angry pops and crackles, and time faded out.

* * *

 _Aput: Inuit root for snow, Calor : Latin for heat._


	6. Chapter 6

Ron left the ball with a heavy heart. The penultimate child of the Weasley family had many skills – well... some skills... I guess chess, mostly – anyway, introspection wasn't one of them. And though most skills seemed to Ron to be unimportant, lately he felt as if he had a lot to gain in this particular area. Or more to the point, a lot to _salvage_.

He knew, on some level, that one is conditioned by his family, and he also knew that his family was... Let's say it was extreme. Extremely large, and extremely poor. If there was a spectrum of families, it was on one of the extremities. And this meant his familial conditioning was _unusual_ ; he was aware of that fact...

If he compared his situation with... Hermione's for example. Well of course, she was different because magic was as new for her as interacting with muggleborns was for him, but she was also an only child in a fairly well-off family. And he truly, sincerely wasn't jealous of her in any way; he had long since realised that he wouldn't trade the noisy adversarial mess of a single Weasley dinner for that kind of lonely comfort.

He had also noticed that a consequence of Hermione's upbringing was that her social skills were not top-notch, so to speak. She was well spoken, well read and looked like she hadn't experienced a day of hunger in her life, but she was also bossy, she had trouble understanding that one could hold different values as her, or even have different knowledge, interests... And boy could she _talk_...

Contrary to a popularly held belief, Ron had also noticed that she wasn't particularly competitive. She didn't really care about grades and took it graciously when – admittedly rarely – someone outshone her in class. She treated these occasions as chances to fill gaps in her knowledge. But ask her a question – or not, she'll tell you anyway – and she'll seem conceited and contemptuous. Not by design, he knew, and he also knew she didn't actually _feel_ superior... She just acted that way. Sometimes with the best intentions. _Win-GAR-dium Levi-OH-_ sa, right?...

Never tell her this, but some of these traits could also be seen – to an extreme degree and with extreme prejudice – in Malfoy, another single child from a rich household. And stupid. Rich and stupid household. And without the best intentions part.

Harry was... harder. Lonely childhood, but not pampered... Well, I guess 'not pampered' would be an understatement. He was also muggle raised, which had made him dependent on Ron's interiorised knowledge and Hermione's learned one, but more to the point he was... Self-deprecating. In a very subtle way. Ron had entirely missed it at first. For example, most of Harry's jokes were at his own expense. Conversely, Ron had learned humour with his brothers which meant teasing others and defending yourself at all cost. Harry tried to tease sometimes, but it always felt a bit stilted.

Harry also _never_ consciously admitted to having any talent. Which was kind of infuriating, because he had _a lot_ of that. Boy-who-lived stuff notwithstanding, of course. His mastery of magic was not as stellar as Hermione's, but the very fact that he was a serious contender for people who had been bathed in magic since birth was already kind of astounding, even if he _was_ outclassed by the traditional such-a-genius-you-have-to-wonder-if-she's-really-a-muggle-born-witch, of which there seemed to be one per generation. Then, there was Quidditch... Not a second on a broom and he pulled off a perfect catch of an object no larger than a Snitch, which admittedly was more predictable in its fall but was farther away, harder to see, and had to be caught while dodging trees in a friggin' forest... Of course McGonagall had put him on the team, she was just lucky that there was no professional recruiter looking or he would have been snatched away immediately to be trained for a national team somewhere.

And yet, if you talked to him about it, his expression would just say 'you're being nice, but I'm pretty sure anyone can do that.' It wasn't even that he was modest, he just could even conceive for a second that he was particularly good at anything.

Even his blasted unshakeable courage, for Merlin's sake! How do you get to the point of putting your life at risk on _every occasion_? Without any sort of hesitation? Harry's self-destructive bravery was a tough act to follow. It was his very first instinct to run _towards_ every potentially dangerous situation. Well, except when he was the only one who could stand to gain from it, apparently. Such as this time.

And Ron knew, rationally, that he ought to be worried for Harry. But instead it just made him angry. Why? What was Ron made of that lead him to say these hurtful things to his friend?

Well. We've established that he was from a very poor and very numerous family, so he had to fight. Fight for everything: food, clothes, attention... He was second to last. Only a year older that the youngest. Which meant he had gotten to be the youngest for just a few months before Ginny had come along and stolen his thunder; his whole life he had been fighting to be looked at. The twins had had a few years of being youngest – and each other, mostly. Ginny was the youngest _and_ the only girl, making her the _ultimate favourite child_ , The elder brothers had enjoyed a less chaotic lifestyle during their younger years, but him...

So... Was that his whole deal, then? He wanted to be _seen_?

Admittedly, most of his fantasies revolved around wealth and fame. Wealth was a pretty obvious one, but he could do without it. Had done, in fact, for most of his life. No, the _fame_ part was actually what enthralled him. He wanted people to know his name. He wanted to be loved. He wanted to be special.

But let's be realistic, Ron wasn't special. Except for chess, _maybe_. He _was_ loved, of course he was. Was he? Yes he was. But _was_ he, though?

Let's see, around him you had "They're master tricksters", "He's so diligent and studious", "He's so brave, a Quidditch genius, and gentle with animals too", "He's so talented, a bit of a bad boy, and heir to a pureblood family", and of course let's not forget "She's the only girl in there, let's all be nice to her in a non-threatening teasing way"...

"And then there's Ron. Nothing really special about this one... Kind of superfluous, really..." Of course he wanted to be seen. He wanted to be _known_. He wanted someone to have something special to say about him... because who would love someone so... bland.

Harry was special. And he not only disregarded that, he actively spurned it. He couldn't even notice he was special, and whenever something happened to make it so painfully obvious that he just _had_ to consider it a possibility, he just shouted " _no I'm not! go away!_ " and slammed the door on his well deserved stardom... Ron knew perfectly well that Harry could have aced that first task... He said it himself: he practically had, two years ago. With a sword, because wands are too easy. Ron would have just pissed himself, or gotten concussed before it even began or something.

Yes, Ron was jealous. And that was _particularly stupid_ of him. Stupid to be jealous of someone who had led the sort of life that would make you that way. Stupider still to resent him for being that way in the first place; he knew what life it was. He knew what it meant and why he had it... The trade had seemed impossible with Hermione's pampered but lonely upbringing and yet somehow, dead parents, a horrible foster family, and an abysmal sense of self-worth didn't. And all because he could justify all of _that_ with a single "at least people _notice_ him." Pathetic.

Ron had taken a few detours around the castle before returning to the dorms but he had been standing in front of an inquisitive-looking fat lady for a good five minutes, now. Ditching Parvati at the ball wasn't a nice thing to do, but after that prank had reminded him of his own bad faith... He thought she'd understood when he'd told her he had to go. She hadn't liked it, though...

Ron took a deep breath and entered the common room. There was a flurry of movement in front of the fire when a brown-haired head peeked above the back of the couch, reddened, and shot back down.

Ron walked very slowly to the couch, both to procrastinate for a last few seconds and to let them put their figurative pants back on (at least he hoped the literal pants were only figuratively down). When he saw the back of two heads sitting next to each other, he sat down next to a pretty flustered Harry, Hermione cowering behind him. He pondered a while... Whatever that was, it was a perfectly good excuse to leave them to it and apologise later. But...

How did you tell someone you were wrong? You didn't, that would be giving them ammunition and he'd never give his brothers ammunition... But that was the problem, wasn't it? Harry _wasn't_ his brother. He had his own story.

"...So I've been acting like a pretty big moron lately."

He suddenly felt twice as stupid as before, in his frilly dress. It looked like a stereotypical grandma's nightgown. Harry stared at him a bit surprised then at Hermione, probably silently asking for advice. She didn't disappoint.

"... I... I think I'll leave you two to it." She left him to his own devices with an embarrassed mutter.

"Uh.." Harry started, confused. He turned back to Ron with a nonplussed glint in his eye and half-open mouth "Yeah, I've... I've been wondering why."

"So have I. I think I have some clues, if you're interested."

* * *

The following conversation was long and arduous. They almost started yelling at each other a few times but Ron managed to take a step back and remember his goal. He'd just say "wait a second, that's not what I meant to be talking about. Can we strike the last two minutes from the record?" And they'll cool down in the time it took to rewind the discussion. By the end, their relationship wasn't completely mended, but at least it had grown. Eventually, they had exhausted their supply of confessions and had to end it. They were now both staring at the ceiling in the dark, lying on their back on the thick wooly rug by the slumbering fire.

"So..." Ron finally said, "I guess what I meant to say with all this is... Well I know you didn't want to be in the Tournament. I also, on some level, know what it means that you're in it, and it is terrifying and I'm sorry I acted the way I did; I have no excuse I just... I joked about it with the twins, but I really, _really_ wanted to be where you are."

" _I_ don't!"

"I know, I know. And if I were in your place... I mean in-it-but-I-didn't-want-to-be-so-it's-probably-a-nefarious-plot... I mean throwing it is objectively the best strategy you can have. As wretched as it feels seeing you make a joke of the historic rebirth of a very significant part of wizarding culture, which I very seriously wanted to be a part of."

"... Do you really think so?"

"Well yeah. Not only is it safest from a Tournament standpoint, if this turns out to be more than a very convoluted let's-hope-he-has-a-fatal-accident sort of plot, having already sacrificed the possibility of a win enables you to be more aware of your surroundings. See who helps, who hinders, what strange occurrences happen, this sort of thing. If I'd had my head screwed on straight I'd have supported this option."

"... I suppose. Doesn't feel very Gryffindorish, though."

"Well... I don't know. Going against expectation is pretty brave. Though you're right that it's not the sort of bravery that's usually _celebrated_ , here. Which is why it is courageous in the first place."

Harry didn't seem very convinced. One's own expectations were probably the hardest to forego.

"You know, I've spoken with Fleur about this." Harry remembered.

"Bravery paradoxes?"

"Our row."

"With Fleur?" Ron looked a bit alarmed "Oh Merlin. She'll think me a complete _git_ , now."

"Well, _are_ you a complete git?" Ron had to smile at the jab. Maybe Harry was better at teasing than he'd given him credit for.

"...Yeah, I guess I am. How did it come up?"

"We talked about the importance of having friends and family to support us in these difficult trials"

"Ouch."

They chuckled a bit at his admissions of guilt.

"Anyway, she told me about this French quote... From a writer or something... She translated it on the fly anyway, but here goes: 'The defining characteristic of a true friend is their ability to disappoint. Certainly, one can be slightly disappointed in one's favourite politician, or the performances of the... the Chudley Cannons. But pure, unadulterated disappointment can only be given by a true friend.'"

"Mmh... Clever. And very French: real bleak, and everything. At least I'll react better when you disappoint me back, now."

Harry let out a soft chuckle "I'm sure you won't."

"Oi! I will, after the first flare of stupid has passed..."

Not perfect, but on the mends then. Ron let the following pause start the scarring process.

"Yeah... So Hermione, eh? How did _that_ happen, you lucky bastard?" Harry's face brightened up intensely, still turned to the ceiling. Ron's eyes flickered to the side to see it, the rest of his own face as expressive as an un-vandalized 'no smoking' sign.

"Well I'm not sure how long it had been from the very start, but it was still in the middle of happening when you came in."

"Oh? Oh! Oh... I'm sorry, I thought... I should leave you two to go back to it, I – Wait... did you see where she went?"

* * *

Hermione had never felt so stupid before.

There were a few reasons for that. Firstly, there was that whole kissing business which wasn't like her at all. She had lost control and she wasn't sure she liked that. She _had_ liked it a lot, and she was absolutely sure she didn't like _that_. Kissing your best friend wasn't something that one did, everyone knew that. Lavender knew it, Parvati knew it, which meant that by the theorem of recursive yakety-yak, everybody and their cat knew that.

"But why not, though?" a well-known, particularly subversive part of her brain asked – a part which was usually muted or quashed under the mental equivalent of her foot, but had apparently been temporarily freed by this kissing incident...

Anyway, she wasn't really sure why, but it had to do with romantic and friendly relationships being inherently different, and the importance of putting people in their proper category.

Anyway, that was bad, certainly. But not as bad as her second reason for feeling incredibly stupid.

In her disoriented embarrassment, she had exited to the corridor in her pyjamas instead of fleeing to her dorm. She couldn't go back now: she'd heard them starting a much needed conversation before she had fully exited... and there was still a chance that they hadn't noticed her absolutely appalling stupidity. She had managed to trick them into not noticing it for more than three years now, and didn't want her streak to stop.

So she was stuck.

* * *

Cedric had never felt so happy before.

There were a few reasons for that. Firstly, there was that whole Ball business. Cho and him had been flirting and tiptoeing around each other for quite a while, but it could still have all been nothing more than friendly banter. He'd been nervous at the idea of asking her to the Ball, and was overjoyed that his leap of faith had been rewarded. Not only that, but they had just had a delightful evening. He was afraid their relationship would tense up and become less friendly in an effort to pump up the Yule-Ball-appropriate romance, but they actually had a blast.

Anyway, that was good, certainly. But not as good as his second reason for feeling over the moon. When they had discussed the clue for the second Task and how he had discovered it, she'd just said "We should listen to it together." Just like that. Not a blush, not a knowing smile, or even a wink. As if there was nothing more natural in the world than for her to basically offer to join him in his bath to listen to an egg singing a siren's chant.

All for an enigmatic poem which he had already written down, and pretty much solved anyway. He admitted that he had already figured out that he was going to have to rescue some _one_ – probably her – from an underwater trap, so she added "we can also practice, then". Still no blush, still no indication that it was a joke, or indeed anything other than perfectly normal conversation between two human beings.

So he had left the ball discreetly, run back to the Hufflepuff dorms to fetch the egg and his bathroom equipment, and he was currently walking very briskly to the prefect bathroom where she had promised she would meet him.

On his way back, he spotted that Granger girl, the one who was always with Harry Potter. Except she was alone, outside what he knew to be the Gryffindor dorms. In her pyjamas, apparently, and looking pretty cross with herself.

Cedric stopped. Potter had been a good sport. Voluntarily throwing the first task so that the original champions could have a normal Tournament was certainly nice of him. It also proved that he wasn't in it for the glory, or indeed of his own volition at all. Especially considering that, had he indeed found a way to stuff his name in the cup, there would still only be one Hogwarts champion. Which seemed to indicate foul play anyway.

It didn't seem right that he didn't even have a clue about the next Task. He wouldn't be able to just stun himself out of that one. And Granger would certainly be his hostage now...

Cedric decided that the least he could do was tell them. He approached the younger girl, who blushed at her own appearance when she saw that someone else had seen her in her night clothes. Bluish white pyjamas with little grimoires flying on them, hilariously enough. But he didn't have time to ask her about the mystery of her flannelled excursion: Cho was waiting. He just handed her the egg and declared:

"You can give that to Potter, and tell him to open it under water. I think I'm done with it; if he has any questions I'll gladly answer them. I can show him to the prefect's bathroom... But not, uh, not tonight. Okay?"

He left without giving her time to form a reply. Cho and him wouldn't _actually_ need the egg anyway. Would they? No. No they would not.

* * *

 _So apparently I'm back. Didn't have much time last year, but My schedule is reopening and so are my files for this fic. Hopefully I haven't forgotten too much of what I wanted to write..._


	7. Chapter 7

_What? Another one so soon?_

 _Yeah well don't get used to it: I'm dumping what I had already started last year. I'm missing a full chapter after this one, and then I have some material that's ready, some that needs work... Next chapter needs to be written from scratch so it'll probably be longer._

 _And now, for a completely unrelated question:_

 _Do you guys think_ trigger warnings _are important? Right now I'm thinking even asking the question is sort of a spoiler... Usually, I'm completely against them, but that's just based on how_ I _like to enjoy stories..._

 _Great, so now everybody's assuming the worst and you'll just be completely underwhelmed by what actually happens... So here's what I'll do: I'll leave it at that, and if you absolutely want to know why I'm asking, you can just check out the ending note real quick._

* * *

Harry and Hermione were walking in silence side by side. She had a few random books pressed against her chest. She didn't actually need them where they were going but they comforted her, and gave her hands something to hold on to. She kept her gaze firmly fixed in the direction of her slow but purposeful stride, her head held high and her lips lightly pressed together. In fact, the only thing that betrayed her inner turmoil was a regular but infrequent twitch of her lower lip, which occurred when she flexed all of her self-control in a concerted effort to refrain from chewing on it.

She would _not_ look at him.

She would not look at him even though it seemed like a _really_ good idea. The left side of her vision – where she knew she would find him should she choose to turn her gaze which, let me reiterate, _she would not do_ – was subtly attractive, somehow. The light coming from that direction seemed a bit brighter, but at the same time more comfortable for her eyes. It was enticing, and she knew that her eyes would wander in that direction by themselves as soon as she would stop thinking about it.

So she didn't. Except when she had to concentrate on refraining from chewing her lower lip, of course. Fortunately she managed to limit these momentary lapses of reason to furtive half-glances, not even registering in her brain as she immediately blinked her eyes into submission.

So far, she hadn't been caught. But she _had_ noticed that he was fidgety. When Harry was fidgety, of course, he wouldn't actually _fidget_. No: one knew that Harry was fidgety because his hands moved _less_ than usual. His fingers looked a bit more stiff and his hands carried around them an air of unnatural motionlessness. One recognised fidgety Harry by his overcompensation of restraint.

Because Harry was a mostly restrained person.

Except of course when his hands were pressed possessively against her lower back while his lips drank hers with a fiery passion. She felt the hair on the nape of her neck rise with the sound of a sizzlingly sharp intake of breath running along its curve. She bit her lip to prevent the sound from escaping, but this time her eyes kept true.

She was still unused to the feeling of her neck being exposed...

Alright, so yes she had her hair up; no it had nothing to do with what he'd said about her shoulders. She'd just decided to do that this morning. On her own. For no particular reason.

They hadn't actually _talked_. Ron had kind of stopped everything, she had escaped like the courageous lion she was, and when she'd come back she'd just blushed, given him the egg while robotically repeating what Cedric had told her, and ended her tirade on 'good night', all in a single breath, before darting for the stairs. She had bravely avoided him all day, and now was the time for their joined detention.

When he'd asked her to the ball, she hadn't really questioned his intentions. He said 'best friends' and she assumed he meant... Sure, his weird half-denial when he'd asked if he fancied her had been a bit suspect, but she assumed he was trying to spare her feelings... It had been kind of cute, in a depressing sort of way: a sort of teasable mishap. But then she had actually teased and he'd blurted out... Oh _god_! And she had... But she didn't even know how...

She tried to stop thinking. It didn't seem to be working anyway. Every sentence her brain conjured ended up in images, tactile remanences, and half-evoked feelings.

Harry and Hermione entered Prof. McGonagall's office only to see her hunched over her desk, crushing something in what looked like a clay crucible. The whole office smelled of herbs and smoke.

"Sit." She told them, not looking up from her preparation. They walked to the front of her desk only to realise that there was no chair there.

"No, no. You'll sit on the floor. Over there." She gestured to a fairly large square of the floor behind them, where a comforter had been laid, covered with a sizeable amount of coloured cushions. A small wooden bowl in the centre was letting out powerfully odorous smoke.

"Sit crossed legged, backs straight, facing away from each other and not too close to one another. Then close your eyes and proceed to draw long, deep breaths in the incense."

McGonagall's no-nonsense tone was even more no-nonsense than usual. They complied, a bit nervously at first, but the smell was very relaxing. They soon found that their perceptions took way more space in their minds. They weren't heightened, just bigger. Their thoughts, on the other hand, were more difficult: almost as if they were propagating through some sort of molasses. They were stirred out of their daze when McGonagall laid two wooden bowls in front of them, each with a dark green, thick substance in it.

"What is it?" Hermione asked, not knowing whether she was referring to the liquid in front of her or to the pleasantly incapacitating incense.

"It's a magic imbued form of a South-American plant called Ayahuasca." Came the reply. Harry probably didn't know what that was, but Hermione should have been worried. She tried to be, but failed miserably.

"Oh. Okay." She enunciated serenely, "So are we going on a mystical journey using hallucinogenic drugs, then?"

"A hallucinogenic potion, technically. A journey to find your true self and its animal form."

* * *

Harry wasn't feeling very good. There was a large, ornate, oppressive, heavy-looking door looming on his right. It didn't move, yet it was always a few feet to his right whether he walked, ran, turned his head... Maybe it was the door of McGonagall's office, seeping into his vision? He couldn't see it very well from a side glance, but he didn't think it looked like an office door.

The rest wasn't much better. It looked like the forbidden forest if the forbidden forest had been much more _alive_. A sort of soft, silky, greyish grass covered the ground, the undulating trees had a white glow to them, and it was all bathed in the fresh daylight of a bright morning, even though the sky was pitch black. His professor had told him to look for a guide. He looked around. No one... Except for this annoying door, but he didn't want to open it. So he walked, and the door followed.

Hermione couldn't have predicted that this thought would one day cross her mind, but she _really_ didn't like this library. It was too dark, the shelves were too tall, the corridors they formed were too labyrinthine, and the old books were all blank. All they had were titles but the letters kept shifting... It was completely dark and she didn't have a wand. She had entered Prof. McGonagall's office in her robes, but she was now wearing one of her usual muggle outfits. It made her feel sharply out of place in the distinctly magical library full of old grimoires and scrolls. Her only source of light was a perfectly mundane lantern, rattling in her hand as she waved it left and right in her search. What self respecting witch brings an actual _flame –_ no matter how firmly the lantern was shut – in a magical library? And what was she searching for anyway? Everything looked the same...

Walking into the forest made the forest thicker, whatever the direction he picked. Including _backwards_... That was about the only observation Harry had made thus far. And he thought the forest looked alive because of the grass and the motion, but he had yet to encounter the trace of any animal. He'd only used his eyes, up to now... So he decided to use his other senses. He crouched to feel the grass between his fingers: it was really thin. Almost like hair. He closed his eyes, sniffed around, tried to listen for sounds... There were none.

No! Wait... There was... some sort of slithering whisper on his right... He turned towards it and listened again... It was on his right again. Always on his right... From behind the door?

She was reading the blank books. Not only was she reading the blank books, it was taking her an excruciatingly long time to finish every blank paragraph, as though she were suddenly _bad at reading_ or something. She was growing increasingly frustrated with this vision quest.

There was a sudden noise behind her, like a throat being cleared if a throat could somehow be snarky. She turned to find someone she hadn't thought about in years.

"Hullo there, weirdo. I'm your guide."

"You? You're my guide? In a library? _You?_ Olivia?"

Olivia was the girl who had made her primary school unbearable. Why would _Olivia_ be her guide?

"Well, this is only what _you_ chose for yourself, weirdo. I know what kind of animal you are and I'm here to make you realise it. Spoiler alert: it's puny, insignificant, and weird looking. Like you!"

Olivia had grown up. Her straight blonde hair had grown browner and much frillier and her green eyes had darkened several shades. Her teeth were more protuberant than than she remembered, but she'd always seen her with a retainer anyways... Still there was no mistaking it. She'd recognised her instantly, and even if she'd had a doubt her tone said it all: it was definitely Olivia. And Hermione was horrified to see her dressed in a Hogwarts uniform.

"I know what you are", Olivia taunted "'cause _I_ made you that way."

Harry approached the door. He really didn't want to touch it. He didn't want anything to do with it. He had to approach it walking like a crab, because it would not budge from the right hand side of his body, on the edge of his vision. He hated the door. The slithering sound increased as he approached it. His own mind's resistance increased as well, but he finally noticed that it wasn't _him_.

It wasn't him who wanted to be as far away from that door as he could. It was someone else. Or maybe it was that lonely forest. Alive, but lonely... Empty of life, like the Boy-Who-Lived-When-His-Parents-Didn't...

Was that silent forest supposed to be his guide? A guide to where? There was only this door...

Why did the Forest-Who-Lived hate the door so much?

He found the handle by touch, gathered his determination, and pulled.

Minerva was watching the proceedings like a hawk, an enchanted scarf on her face to filter out the fumes. Under proper supervision, this stage was relatively safe. Difficult on the soul, certainly, and it was very possible to irreversibly fail, but it was a fairly safe trial over all. The whole Animagus detention wasn't very legal, but she should be able to deal with any mishap herself; something would have to go _really_ pear-shaped before she'd ask someone else for help.

She knew they were doing something very difficult. From the outside, though, it was quite boring...

Until something suddenly went as pear-shaped as was conceivable.

It began almost innocuously with Harry's face. His eyes and brow remained completely relaxed, but his mouth twisted into an ugly expression. It opened with surreal slowness, wider and wider until it was just slightly larger than should have been possible. Minerva had simply never seen such a strange reaction. She didn't know what it could mean.

The mouth started screaming suddenly, two discordant pitches at once, rage and pain intermingling in a chaos of sound; the teapot on her desk blew up.

Hermione's face whipped towards the direction of the scream. It came from far away, down a corridor she hadn't noticed before. She immediately abandoned Olivia to run in that direction. The corridor turned left; so did she. Olivia was already waiting for her around the corner.

"That's not the way, you know"

"I know, shut up" She hadn't even slowed her sprint. After another turn, Olivia was there again, sitting on a pile of books by a shelf.

"You shouldn't do that, it's not part of the vision"

"Shut up!"

Another sprint. It was a long one. The scream became louder.

"You can't ever come back here if you manage to leave, weirdo."

This time she didn't even bother answering

"Oh my god, it's like you want to fail or something, this is hilarious."

" _Shut up you insufferable cunt!"_ She'd really wanted to say 'know-it-all', but hadn't dared.

After the last turn, there was only a dead end.

"Hah!" Olivia said from behind her. "You even failed at failing. Girl, you are cracking me up." The corridor ended on a massive ebony set of bookshelves on which opalescent rows of books were neatly arranged, like as many carnivorous teeth. She tried to climb it but the large books prevented her from grabbing the shelves, so she took one, pulled it out – with great difficulty: it seemed almost rooted there – and threw it behind her. It had cut her hand. They were sharp like teeth too! The emptied space on the shelf started bleeding under her fingers when she grabbed it to pull herself up. She ignored the pain, ignored her wounded hands covered in blood, and repeated her actions. Pull out a too– book, grab the shelf, pull yourself up, etc. She climbed slowly, the blood from her fingers mixing with the one from the shelves. Her arms and legs were soaked.

Olivia had finally shut her ugly, misshapen, disgusting face.

Minerva was _trying_. She was throwing everything she knew at the boy to wake him up. The bezoar had been swallowed whole, the specific antidote against Majahuasca too, and now three stunning spells had disappeared in his mouth. She'd have to call someone. Already. She _almost_ cursed internally.

Who, though? Poppy? Albus?... Both?

Now what? Hermione's eyes had started glowing behind her eyelids – that was more expected but way too quick! And at the worst possible time! She threw a handful of Floo in her waiting fireplace and called for help.

Hermione had finally reached the place behind her eyes. From there she could see. She saw McGonagall's office in weird colours, distorted shapes... She saw the teacher crawling on all fours approaching the roaring fire in the chimney head first. The gruesome suicide she imagined panicked her for a second, before she remembered the existence of Floo. But the idea of her teacher crawling on the floor to burn her own face off wouldn't leave her distraught mind. Finally, she saw Harry.

He was covered in snakes.

Ethereal, slimy, black snakes were pouring out of his forehead and open mouth, muffling his screams. Not muffling them enough.

She twisted her body and leapt on him, pinning his shoulders to the floor under her weight, and proceeded to swipe at the snakes, careful not to nick his face with her fingernails.

Claws?

The snakes only flowed even more intensely. She killed more, mauling, clawing, biting and spitting away with more and more ferocity. Their blood covered her skin – fur? – Some were biting her paws – err, hands! –, her arms, her legs... She ignored them for now, but she'd have to shake them off at some point. She could still hear his screams; as long as she could hear his screams he was breathing.

She didn't know how, but he was.

A black ooze had started rolling down on his face, dragged everywhere from his scar under the slithering bellies, extending the blackened lighting bolt on his forehead in thick Lichtenberg figures all over his skin and clothes and sometimes on the comforter below them.

Minerva pulled her head out of the fire to witness a thoroughly escalated scene. Hermione, still delirious from her experience, straddling Harry's prone form, her hands clawing at something just above his face. No. No time for this new development.

" _Stupefy!_ "

She dodged with what Minerva recognised as a clearly feline agility, and the spell hit Harry, to little effect. Hermione locked eyes with her and let out a raucous snarl which melted into a short, gravelly roar, before getting back to her task with abandon. She seemed conscious enough to be at least convinced that she was helping, rather than genuinely trying to eat his face. Minerva was officially at a loss.

Albus stepped out of the chimney and didn't even pause

" _Stupefy_! _Impedimenta_! — !"

His third incantation had been lost to a blood curdling roar. Planks of the wooden floor creaked and tore upwards in a splintery crash, shielding the two teenagers from Albus's onslaught of magic. Hermione's swipes grew a bit less forceful; it looked like she was tiring herself.

The flow of serpents wasn't getting any slower, but Hermione was more and more physically exhausted. She was distantly aware that she was crying. She shook off some of the snakes attached to her body; when she went back to it, the venom had managed to put her arms to sleep.

' _She's tiring herself out'_ she distantly understood what the silver haired ape said. ' _Ignore her and try to help Harry'._ Couldn't they see that it was the snakes' venom making her lose control of her body, rather than exhaustion?

She leaned down and continued her with her fangs, biting into as much darkness as she could, trying her best to dodge the ones that tried to bite back...

Eventually, after a very long and yet dishearteningly short time, she collapsed on him. Her upper body had finally lost its battle against paralysis. By then, though, he had actually progressed; his mouth had closed, stopping both the screaming and the flow of serpents. Only his scar kept bleeding snakes but those were mostly slithering upwards, away from her and onto the disgusting comforter. She heard hurried steps, muffled by the venom-induced nausea.

"What the..." Poppy should be instructed to never begin a diagnostic with that ever again "He's doing this! Subconsciously I think, if only because he doesn't seem very awake..."

"What is it?"

"Some sort of rejection, he's expelling something... That black ooze... What in the world did you give him?"

"Nothing that would produce _that_!"

"What the..." Someone really ought to tell her not to say that "She's not asleep, she's paralysed! Look she's still conscious, she's – what in the world is that girl doing?"

Hermione couldn't do much anymore. The paralysis was spreading. Her fur was mostly crusted in coagulated blood, and most of her abdomen was asleep. She could still lick his cheek affectionately, so she did. It felt natural in her desperation, for some reason. She used the few muscles she still had under her control to nuzzle closer to him, pushing her forehead against his head.

Unable to do more.

Paralysed.

Useless.

Terrified.

He was going to die.

Panic gripped her stomach with a cold, twisting, iron fist.

"I suggest we step back. In fact, I think we should exit the room." Albus calmly proposed, interrupting as Poppy tried fruitlessly to pull the mostly paralysed girl away from the catatonic boy: she was incredibly heavy – even for magic – and her breath was accelerating to a clearly impossible rate.

"What?"

"Her magic is bubbling up, I believe it's about to lash out. His is already active." Two bursts of accidental magic in the same place could have some spectacular interactions. The three of them scurried away from the two teens and into the corridor, Albus resting his back on the door as it closed behind him.

There was a sound like a solid ball of glass being broken in two, a white flash from under the door. The stone floor shook under them and the door itself inflated as it was pushed outwards despite Albus's efforts, letting out screaming jets of black smoke. After a few seconds, it was over as abruptly as it had begun, and Albus waited no time in heading back in the darkened office, Minerva and Poppy on his heels.

The floor, walls, and ceiling were covered in pitch black soot. Only a small disk of floor around the two teens had been spared, suggesting that they had been the source of all that darkness.

Poppy hurried to them waving her wand about. Hermione was half-draped over him, face nuzzled in his neck; it would have been cute if it weren't so... so–

"She's asleep. She doesn't even seem paralysed anymore"

Minerva let out one half of the breath she was holding.

"He's... Unconscious? His magic is still very much active... I think it's repairing something... In any case, it seems the urgency has passed. Whatever it was. _Cibeiria_."

Both teens were raised off the ground as if on an invisible stretcher. Minerva let out the rest of the contents of her lungs as she collapsed on a pitch black chair, raising a plume of soot.

"I don't know what kind of detention that was, Minerva, but I think it was a tad much." Albus half-twinkled as he followed Poppy out. She'd catch up with them as soon as her heart rate allowed it.

* * *

 _The trigger-warning question was a code! :D_

 _Check out the first letter of each sentence of the beginning note, starting with 'Do you guys...'_

 _Yeah, we have fun here. Also I don't like spoilers so I'm not going to make it easy for you to spoil yourself, am I? I mean have you seen what passes for summaries in my fics?_

 _Alright so_ maybe _I shouldn't have put this at the end of the chapter if the point was to prevent spoilers. Maybe I just wanted to do a cryptic trigger warning..._

 _Oh and there is also one instance of 'language' I should maybe warn Americans about, but who really cares about that?_

* * *

 _Cibeiria Cibaria, popular latin for stretcher._


End file.
